History Revealed

The year 1789 represented a watershed in the evolution of democratic government. Not only was this the year that the fledgling United States agreed upon 12 amendments to the Constitution – 10 of which would later become the Bill of Rights – but it wa

MARISA LINTON is professor emerita of history at Kingston University and an expert on the French Revolution, 18th-century politics and the Enlightenment. Her forthcoming book, Terror: The French Revolution and its Demons, co-written with Michel Biard

The French Revolution was a time of seismic political and societal change for France – a period that saw King Louis XVI, and thousands of others, lose their heads to ‘Madame Guillotine’, and the birth of a new French Republic. The ripples of the revo

An impressive haka danceis performed in Rotorua, New Zealand, to mark the arrival of the Duke of Cornwall (the future King George V) during his 1901 tour of the British empire. The ceremonial posture dance was originally performed by Maori warriors a

Britain declares war on France in the American Revolutionary War. French money, troops, weaponry and ships help America achieve independence from Britain, but saddle France with debt. Summoned by Louis XVI, the Estates-General is convened for the f

The French Revolution saw external and internal warfare on a massive scale – from war on France’s borders as the other major powers of western Europe attacked French territory, to what became a bloody civil war in the Vendée in western France, a regi

It was the most remarkable prison break in history: in 1918, as World War I raged on seemingly without end, two young British officers escaped from a remote Turkish prison camp… by means of a Ouija board. Yet that scheme – a meticulously conceived, r

The French Revolution had brought down the centuries-old regime of absolute monarchy and privileged nobility. In its place, the revolutionaries founded a new regime based on principles of individual liberty, equal rights, and popular sovereignty. Yet

A new study suggests that some of Canterbury Cathedral’s stained glass could be among the oldest surviving examples in Europe. The 86 Ancestor windows, which depict the ancestors of Christ, were originally thought to have been made in the early 13th

The Chinese Civil War was a series of conflicts between the Communist Party of China and the country’s Nationalist government. The war is regarded as having been fought in two distinct stages: between 1927 and 1937, and then again between 1946 and 19

Up until the dawn of revolution, in the era now known as the ancien régime, France was divided into three clear social classes, or estates. The First Estate was occupied by the Roman Catholic clergy. In the second half of the 18th century, it numbere

As dawn broke over the Bastille on 14 July 1789, Bernard-René Jourdan de Launay – governor of the 400-year-old royal fortress – must have sensed that this was to be a day like no other. How could he have thought otherwise? For days now, a mob had ram

“I killed one man to save 100,000,” Charlotte Corday allegedly claimed during her trial for the grisly assassination of the revolutionary Jean-Paul Marat. Disillusioned with the radical and violent direction that Marat’s radical Montagnard faction wa

Women played a pivotal role in an event often known as the October Days, or the October March, that propelled the first stage of the revolution into a new balance of power. On the morning of 5 October 1789, many Parisian women were demonstrating over

Inspired by the cockades (see opposite page) worn by revolutionaries, the tricolore became the national flag of France in 1790. Red and blue were the colours of Paris, while white represented the monarchy (which hadn’t yet been abolished). Originally

Marie Antoinette arrived at the Conciergerie in the Temple Prison, Paris, at 3am, after being torn from the arms of her daughter, Marie-Thérèse, and her sister-in-law, Madame Élisabeth. Her husband, King Louis XVI, had been executed earlier in the ye

7 The number of weeks that the so-called Great Terror lasted – the most intense and brutal period of the Terror 50% The percentage of the prison population of Paris killed in the September Massacres of 1792 17,000 The official number of execution

The 15-month period between Robespierre’s execution in July 1794 and the establishment of a new government, the French Directory, in November 1795 was known as the Thermidorian Reaction – named after Thermidor, the month of the French Republican Cale

In 1965, the Tryweryn Valley in north Wales was chosen as the location for the new Llyn Celyn reservoir, which would supply fresh water to Liverpool and the Wirral. In the valley, however, was the small village of Capel Celyn, which would have to be

SHORT ANSWER The British were addicted to tea, so started an illegal trade to get the Chinese addicted to drugs LONG ANSWER Such was the British love of Chinese goods – like porcelain, silk and, of course, tea – that some of their merchants got into

Archive on 4: The Greenham Effect / BBC Radio 4, Saturday 4 September On 27 August 1981, a group of around 40 women set off on a march from Cardiff to RAF Greenham Common, located near Newbury in Berkshire. Their protest was sparked by the British g

FREE ENTRY IWM London, opens 20 October, iwm.org.uk/visits/iwm-london Two permanent new galleries dedicated to the history of World War II and the Holocaust are set to open at IWM London following a £30.7 million refurbishment project. Featuring sto

By Neil Oliver Bantam Press, £25, hardback, 432 pages Pleasingly leaning into the idiosyncrasies of the format from its first page – how can we do justice to history’s rich pageant in merely 100 moments? – this is a very personal take on the global

In the first paragraph of your recent article on the Burning of Washington (August 2021), Emma Slattery Williams states that the evening of 24 August 1814, when British troops set the government buildings ablaze in Washington, was the first time sinc

PLUS... GREATEST QUOTES OF THE PAST 100 YEARS MUNITIONETTES OF WORLD WAR I THE NEWPORT RISING SPOTLIGHT ON: ALFRED THE GREAT WHAT IF... THE WHITE SHIP HADN’T SUNK IN 1120? AND MUCH MORE... ■

Inmates at HMP Wormwood Scrubs in London have their photograph – or mugshot – taken for the prison register. They are holding up their hands to show distinguishing features, such as missing fingers or tattoos, and a mirror is held to the side to show

Q: Was the revolution in France inevitable? A: I wouldn’t say it was inevitable, because, prior to the revolution, very few people in France could have anticipated that such a thing would happen. At the time, France was the most powerful regime in

Sometimes too much of a good thing can be bad for you – this adage can definitely be said to apply to the tragic events that took place in St Giles, London, on the afternoon of 17 October 1814. Free beer literally flowed along the street, but it was